Grateful Dead
Universal Amphitheater
Universal City, CA
6-30-73
Sick Bits Vol. 9

Source: Matrix (SBD/AUD mix):

SBD: (SHN ID # 177)
SBD> ?> DAT> CD> EAC> SHN via A. Jerugim

AUD: (SHN ID # 6019)
AudMR > R > DAT > WAV > SHN via Noah Weiner

Transfer/Editing:
Both sources were SHN files downloaded from LMA and converted to
WAV > Sony Vegas 5 > WAV > CD Wave > FLAC 16 (level 8)

Matrixed by Chris Chappell
6-22-05
scarfire@liquidcity.com
________________________________________________________________________

Set I:

d1t01 - Promised Land
d1t02 - They Love Each Other
d1t03 - Mexicali Blues
d1t04 - Tennessee Jed
d1t05 - Looks Like Rain
d1t06 - Birdsong
d1t07 - Cumberland Blues
d1t08 - "don't panic folks..."
d1t09 - Row Jimmy
d2t01 - Jack Straw
d2t02 - Deal
d2t03 - Beat It On Down The Line
d2t04 - Black Peter
d2t05 - Playin' In The Band

Set II: 

d3t01 - Greatest Story Ever Told
d3t02 - Ramble On Rose 
d3t03 - El Paso
d3t04 - Dark Star ->
d3t05 - Eyes Of The World ->
d3t06 - Stella Blue  
d3t07 - Sugar Magnolia

Encore:
d3t08 - One More Saturday Night

Total Times:
Disc 1 [52:15]
Disc 2 [38:22]
Disc 3 [79:11]

- for track times see shntool output
________________________________________________________________________

General Notes:

Two sources from the LMA provided coverage for this matrix: a relatively 
decent SBD, and a pretty nice sounding AUD recorded probably at the board 
via the "Debbie connection". The result is an interesting matrix,
with the vocals a little hot in the overall outcome - typical of this era's
SBD mixes, although that's irrelevant when you're deep in the Dark Star.
One of the things I like about the resulting matrix is the ability to bring
back that amphitheater sound.  Many people were yipping and whooping in
between songs just to hear their own echo.  

Check out these comments from DeadBase:

"On Saturday night, one of the crew lit a fireworks fountain up on one of 
the PA towers creating a moment of panic for some folks who thought it was 
an electrical fire but Garcia calmed 'em down with a simple, 'Don't panic
folks, this is the movies - remember..'.

"In an interesting footnote to these shows, the official Grand Opening of 
this brand new venue on the Universal Studios backlot was the following
weekend with a week-long series of Frank Sinatra shows but the Dead gave 
it a real shakedown acid test first."
 
A review from the LLama:

"The Playin is typically great for 1973, and the Dark Star>Eyes>Stella Blue 
combination puts this one over the top for me. Very unique jams. And BTW, 
the Wall of Sound seems to work pretty well tonight. Nice quality. An 
overlooked show that will knock you out!" - Dr. Flashback

Thanks to A. Jerugim for the SBD, and Noah Weiner for the A>D transfer of
the AUD as well as all the folks involved with the Audience Devotional Tree.

Enjoy!
Chappy

Attached:

Shntool output
Editing Notes  
FLAC Fingerprint 
SBD & AUD source Notes
Timeline/Tracking Notes:

The transition between all three discs can be put together seemlessly.
I tracked this show so that disc 3 contains the entire second set.
It would be possible to edit out 40 seconds of crowd/tuning from the
first set and burn a 90 minute CDR.

Editing Notes:

- Pitch
Both sources were pitched differently, the AUD being the sharpest, 
and the SBD being the flatest. The AUD on average had to be pitched
down on average about .05 (5 cents), and the SBD had to be pitched up
about .15 (15 cents) to achieve pitch correction - 1.00 being 100 cents 
which is a semitone.  The result is very close to A=440Hz, however there
is some fluctuation throughout the show due to the age of the recordings.

- Synch
Even after pitch correcting the AUD and the SBD, because of the speed 
fluctuation within a given source, multiple edits were performed to keep 
the sources synched (too many edits to list).

- Sonic Quality/Matrix ratio
The AUD did receive a little EQ to revive some of the high end that was lost
to previously employed NR. The SBD remained untouched sonically. Conceptually, 
all I was trying to do here is to add some dimension to the SBD, which is 
pretty dry, by using the ambience of the AUD. The result is a lively but clear 
recording, hopefully close to how it sounded at the show. If I had to guess 
the SBD/AUD ratio would be somewhere between 3:1 and 4:1, leaning more towards 
the 3:1 end of things.

- Edits
The following are places where the SBD had holes or incomplete coverage 
in reference to the final matrix timeline. 

SBD:

d1t02 (5:16 - 5:27) - missing (crowd)
d1t04 (7:33 - 7:37) - missing (crowd)
d1t05 (7:07 - 7:10) - missing (crowd)
d1t06 (7:43 - 8:57) - missing 
d1t06 (10:03 - 10:07) - missing (crowd)
d1t07 (5:28 - 5:34) - missing (crowd)
d1t09 (8:07 - 8:16) - missing (crowd)
d2t01 (4:47 - 6:12) - missing (crowd)
d2t02 (0:00 - 0:02) - missing 
d2t02 (4:40 - 4:46) - missing (crowd)
d2t03 (0:00 - 0:03) - missing 
d2t03 (3:17 - 3:22) - missing (crowd)
d2t04 (8:53 - 8:59) - missing (crowd)
d2t05 (14:52 - 14:56) - missing (crowd)
d3t01 (0:00 - 0:03) - missing 
d3t01 (5:03 - 5:43) - missing (crowd)
d3t02 (6:13 - 8:13) - missing (crowd)
d3t03 (4:15 - 4:51) - missing (crowd)
d3t04>d3t05 (16:16 - 0:07) - missing 
d3t05 (11:39:21 - 11:39:39) - missing
d3t06 (8:06 - 9:15) - missing (crowd)
d3t07 (9:04 - 9:13) - missing (crowd)

AUD:
d1t01 (0:00 - 0:10) - missing 
d1t01 (3:04 - 3:06) - missing (crowd)
d1t02 (5:27 - 5:32) - missing (crowd)
d1t06 (10:07 - 10:09) - missing (crowd)
d2t01 (3:33 - 3:52) - missing 
d2t05 (10:29 - 10:46) - missing 
d3t04 (6:23 - 6:42) - missing
d3t06 (0:37 - 0:47) - missing

- Recap
Full coverage was achieved by combining both sources.  The most significant
pieces missing from the SBD are 1:14 in the middle of Birdsong, and 20
seconds of the transition from Dark Star > Eyes, both likely due to reel
changes.  The rest is tuning/crowd and a few clipped intros.  All of it 
is covered nicely by the AUD.  The missing elements from the AUD are also
likely due to reel changes, and are not that noticeable, although I encourage
the avid listener to locate those points so as to hear the matrix coming back
in - this will reveal the effect of the combination of the two sources.

SHNTOOL output:

Set I:

length     expanded size   cdr  WAVE problems filename
 3:07.17       33026828    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d1t01.flac
 5:32.13       58595420    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d1t02.flac
 3:41.09       39005612    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d1t03.flac
 7:37.09       80636012    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d1t04.flac
 7:16.24       76966892    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d1t05.flac
10:15.21      108535436    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d1t06.flac
 5:31.53       58513100    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d1t07.flac
 0:55.20        9749084    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d1t08.flac
 8:19.10       88047164    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d1t09.flac
 6:15.62       66295868    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d2t01.flac
 4:45.33       50351660    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d2t02.flac
 3:23.51       35929196    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d2t03.flac
 8:59.57       95213708    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d2t04.flac
14:57.24      158287292    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d2t05.flac
90:37.28      959153272 B(totals for 14 files, 0.5621 overall compression ratio)

Set II:

length     expanded size   cdr  WAVE problems filename
 5:43.51       60625196    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d3t01.flac
 8:14.47       87252188    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d3t02.flac
 5:05.56       53933756    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d3t03.flac
16:29.59      174598412    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d3t04.flac
19:25.49      205621292    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d3t05.flac
 9:17.13       98285420    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d3t06.flac
 9:58.64      105637772    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d3t07.flac
 4:55.54       52165052    ---   --   ---xx   gd73-06-30d3t08.flac
79:11.18      838119088 B(totals for 8 files, 0.5495 overall compression ratio)
